


Jar I

by LiquidFix



Series: Jar [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Bees & Beekeeping, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-23
Updated: 2011-08-23
Packaged: 2017-10-22 23:55:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/243975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LiquidFix/pseuds/LiquidFix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John makes a purchase Sherlock doesn’t approve of.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jar I

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted [here](). Although categorised as Sherlock/John, it is implied and not directly stated.

“Hey, what are you doing?! Put that down please, before you drop it and it smashes all over the floor!”

“What _is_ this…?” Sherlock muttered, holding the small jar up to the fluorescent light strip above his head.

John huffed and snatched the object from the detective, placing it on the kitchen table between Sherlock’s microscope and an ancient Tupperware box wrapped in cling film. “It’s honey. What the hell else do you think it could be? Don’t tell me you’ve never seen honey, like you didn’t know custard comes in a can, a carton _and_ a powder.”

Sherlock pulled his dressing gown tight over his svelte frame and scowled at the shorter man. “Of course I know what honey is. I just don’t understand why you’ve brought _that_ -” he retorted, indicating the innocent-looking jar with a deep glare. “into this flat.”

“Says the man who keeps severed body parts in the fridge.” John muttered under his breath, resuming his position by the toaster on the worktop. “What, you got some sort of allergy to it?”

“No, I don’t have an allergy to honey.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

Sherlock pouted for a moment, an expression he wore when trying to find the right combination of words to convey a simple idea (well, an idea that was simple to himself but beyond the realms of comprehension for most mere mortals).

“It’s inferior.” He said eventually with a heavy sigh. “Its very existence offends me.”

Rolling his eyes, John turned his back and pulled the hot, browned bread from the toaster as it popped up. “It’s just honey, Sherlock. How can it possibly be inferior and offend you? It’s not like it’s been sitting there insulting your mother.”

Turning again to retrieve the jar from the table, he seen that Sherlock had planted himself in his chair at the table and was holding the honey again, inspecting the label closely through narrowed eyes.

“‘Blended honey - Sourced from EU and non-EU countries’.” He said carefully, enunciating every syllable. “Do you know what that means?”

“It means exactly what it says. I still can’t see the problem and can I please have it before my toast goes cold?”

Sherlock snorted and held out the jar to him as though it were a hot coal. “I can’t believe you don’t get it.”

Taking it, John quickly unscrewed it and started slathering it over his toast. “Get what? That you’re a food snob? I knew that already, actually. I also know that you don‘t seem to understand that food actually costs money, and that I can‘t afford to buy the ‘best of the best’. If you can‘t stand it that much, just don’t eat it.”

Another sigh from Sherlock. “And ‘flavour rating 3’? I seriously doubt that.”

John finished spreading honey over the toast and pulled a tea plate from the cupboard to sit it on. “Do you always have to do this?”

“What?” Sherlock asked, looking perfectly innocent. John didn’t doubt for a second that the man really had no idea he was being so incredibly irritating.

“Do you always have to have a dig at things like this? You’re making a fuss over honey that _I_ bought for _myself_ to eat. You’re putting me off, like it’s poisoned or something.” John continued, taking a bite of his honey-coated toast for emphasise.

“Oh don’t be obtuse John,” Sherlock snorted. “It’s not poisoned. It’s just, it doesn’t taste very nice.”

“How do you know? You’ve not touched it.” Said John, propping his head in his free hand as he continued to eat the toast, not caring that it was rude to talk with his mouth full and his elbows on the table top. “Not that that’s an invitation to do so, because you’ll get a taste for it and the next time I go to get some you’ll have put the empty jar back in the cupboard, expecting the mysterious food-fairy that stops by in the dead of night to fill it back up for you.”

Sherlock’s scowl deepened, fracturing at the edges. He sat defiantly in his flimsy chair, arms folded across his chest, trying to keep up the image that he truly was hurt by John’s purchase and lack of understanding, when it was obvious that he was only frustrated at himself for not being able to convey his ideas clearly.

“Try some.” John grinned, offering his half-eaten slice of toast to Sherlock across the devastation of an aborted experiment that lay scattered on the kitchen table.

The pout thickened. “No.”

“Go on.”

“No, I refuse to put that stuff in my mouth.”

“Why?”

“I’ve told you, it’s inferior. Nothing like my own honey.”

John stopped mid-chew, his eyebrows reaching for the ceiling. “Your _own honey_?”

The consulting detective nodded, his lips still pursed.

“Forgive my ignorance, but don’t you need bees to make honey?”

“Obviously. What I should have said was ‘nothing like my own honey _will be_ ’.”

Swallowing, John looked about the kitchen. “And this might sound farfetched, but there’s nowhere for you to keep bees here.”

Now it was Sherlock’s turn to roll his eyes, and he relaxed a little into his chair. “Well clearly, John. I’m talking about later, years from now when we retire away from all of this,” he waved an arm in the direction of the disaster zone that was the sitting room. “I want to keep bees.”

Suddenly becoming aware that his mouth had been hanging open for the past minute, John finally relented with the slice of now-cold toast and placed it back on the tea plate. “Wait, wait. When we retire? What exactly do you mean by-” John trailed off as he watched Sherlock’s pout quickly dissolve into a down-and-out smile.

“I didn’t think there were a lot of places to keep bees in London.” He said after a while, picking at the stone-cold toast.

“Oh, plenty of people do. It’s not that unusual, but I wasn’t referring to staying in London.”

John felt his jaw gape a little again. Not that it was difficult to picture Sherlock out of London, but it was downright impossible trying to imagine London without Sherlock in it. Even if it was years from now and John himself-

“Wait, you haven’t answered me. You said ‘we’. When ‘we’ retire.”

Sherlock only nodded, looking a little startled as though John’s voice had shaken him from a momentary fantasy.

“Isn’t that rather presumptuous of you? I mean, I never officially signed up to work with you and with the scraps of locum cover I’m getting just now, I’m practically semi-retired as it is.”

The pout threatened to return as Sherlock listened to his flatmate, as though John digging his heels in was not part of his master plan “I would have thought that if you wanted to pursue a further career in medicine, you would have started doing so by now. Locum work doesn’t suit you, John.”.

“I’m not disagreeing. I know it doesn’t suit me, Christ knows it bores the life out of me but I-”

John stopped and stared down at the plate nestled in the chaos of Sherlock’s life. He’d never really spoken about his career to Sherlock. It had been mentioned in passing to his therapist, but even Sarah didn’t know what he wanted for the future. John didn’t have the heart to tell her that he’d rather be permanently unemployed than spend any more time at the surgery working as a small-time GP. He’d never wanted a career in general medicine, even before he had signed up to the Royal Army Medical Corps and now here he was, working two afternoons a week in an over-pressed surgery, freezing off warts and listening to paranoid mothers fluster about how their toddlers only had a ten-word vocabulary so there was obviously something wrong with them.

Then again, after university John had never wanted to have a flatmate again and he was sitting across from one.

“I was supposed to still be in service just now.” He muttered, no longer hungry. “For another year and a half, actually.”

Sherlock said nothing, but regarded John with a cutting expression.

John squirmed inwardly, feeling Sherlock’s eyes slice through his nerves. “I never made any allowances for being discharged early. I was meant to start planning my next career step now. I guess my life isn’t that bad, but it’s not really turned out how I planned.”

“I’ll bet you never planned to join the Medical Corps when you were training to become a doctor.” Sherlock said quietly.

“No, I didn’t.” John agreed, relaxing a little. It didn’t sting too badly, to talk about it. “I knew I didn’t want to be a GP when I had my university choices, but I didn’t really want to be a surgeon. Army medics are kind of a mix of the two, so when I found out more about them, it seemed perfect.”

“Too perfect?”

John shrugged, “Of course. I’m still glad I did general medicine because it’s given me something to fall back on, but it’s not really my first choice. I’ll bet you never wanted to be a self-employed consulting detective either, but you are and you’re a very good one too.”

Sherlock smiled for a second, visibly pleased with the praise “No, you’re right. I knew what I wanted to do, but there was no real way I could do it and make it fit around other people, so the easiest way to go about it was to do it myself.”

“You don’t really make it fit around me.” John said before he could think, and it shattered the tiny upward curve that had been playing on Sherlock’s lips. He wanted to take it back, but it was out and laid bare on the table between them amongst the pipettes and petri-dishes.

“I didn’t mean that.” Mumbled John, unsure where to look now that he had offended his flatmate.

“You did.” Sherlock quipped, an edge to his voice. “You’re not under any obligation to stay here, you know. You’ve already said that you never signed up to work with me, so you’re free to pack up and leave at any time.”

“Don’t be like this Sherlock. I didn’t mean to sound like I’m ungrateful for this.”

“And what is ‘this’?”

John pulled his bottom lip between his teeth and nipped with his teeth, carefully mulling his thoughts over.

“For having the opportunity to not have to think sometimes.” He said slowly. “You know, when I’m at work it gives me time to think. I sit there behind that bloody awful desk and go ‘what the hell am I doing here?’, and then I remember why I had to take the job - because I had to leave what I _really_ loved doing and I start to get angry because if it was up to me I would still be there, but no one listens when you’re discharged. It’s like you don’t exist, like they’ve gotten what they need from you and you’re expendable. Replaceable. Doesn’t matter that I can still do the job, that I’d give just about anything to feel like I’m doing something that’s worth all the effort I pour into it because ultimately, no one listens to me.”

He stopped, running his tongue over his lips, tasting the feint remains of the honey.

“Sarah doesn’t listen. I can’t tell her how bored I get at the surgery, how it feels like punishment. That’s probably the best way to explain it - that it feels like a waste of my already wasted life, and that I’m being punished for my own stupidity but I can’t tell her how I feel about it, she’s given me more chances than I deserve as it is.”

“Leave, then.” Sherlock replied. “If you hate it that much.”

“Have _you_ been listening to anything I‘ve just said?” John snapped. “It’s not that simple. I can’t walk out.”

“Because Sarah would be hurt.”

“Precisely.”

“Why would she be hurt?”

“Christ, Sherlock…” John groaned, hiding his face in his hand. “Because she just would. She gave me the job in the first place, and she’s let me keep it even though I don’t deserve it.”

“Why would you deserve to have something that upsets you so much?”

“Because!” John snapped. “Because that’s the way it is. I don’t expect you to understand. This isn’t as simple as you make it look. Sarah and I, it would be too complicated if I left.”

Sherlock blinked slowly at him, reclining back into his chair. “So you stay, punishing yourself just to make her happy? To make her like you? Isn’t that what you do with me?”

John peeked at him from between his fingers. “That doesn’t even warrant a proper response, you know that? You couldn’t be any more different from Sarah if you tried, even if you both had tits.”

“I can’t see the difference.”

“Well there’s a huge one, believe me.”

“And what exactly is it?”

John groaned again. “Well for a start I don’t want you to like me.”

“But I do like you.” Sherlock replied blandly, as though he were affirming his name.

“Well that’s your prerogative.”

“You’re different around Sarah.”

John swallowed. Sherlock was right, as usual. He _did_ act differently for Sarah. He’d never wanted the damn job at the surgery to begin with, but then they’d chatted a little and she’d seemed so, well, _nice_. So different from Sherlock. But then, he’d been in ‘interview-mode’ when he’d first met her, sure to remember his ‘p’s-and-q’s” and ever since then he’d felt the need to stay the same. Sarah had never seen his temper snap when he found a tub of rotten animal hides shoved to the back of the fridge or had to put up with his vicious remarks when his leg was bothering him. On the matter of his leg, she’d never seen him limp either. Not that he limped much these days, but it did sometimes make an appearance after a day spent running around London or chasing a sleepless night.

Sherlock had seen him limp though. He’d also seen John when he was spitting feathers, when he was out of breath from trying to keep up with Sherlock’s sudden laps through back alleys. He’d seen what happened when John was scared - a bullet in another man’s chest - and they’d only known each other a day. Sarah didn’t even know that John could hold a gun straight, let alone that he had shot a man dead (okay, he hadn’t been a very nice man but he wasn’t exactly sure that Sarah would understand that so it had been better in the long run to say nothing at all).

And then John felt guilty, because it was always about how Sherlock was difficult to live with, with his disgusting, confusing experiments, the solo-violin pieces being dragged out of the poor tortured instrument at four the morning, the sometimes constant stream of visitors upsetting the sanctity of their home. Even how Sherlock wouldn’t shop for groceries or make tea for himself, and when John described these things to Sarah it had almost given him a kick to vilify the other man, to make him out to be a petulant brat who was prone to throwing a temper tantrum if someone touched his toys.

In reality though, John was just as difficult to live with. He lost his temper frequently and at the tiniest things. If the kettle didn’t click on, he’d stand there and shout at it before realising the reason it wasn’t working was that he had unplugged it earlier in the day and forgotten. If something was not where he remembered putting it, he’d just about tear the immediate area apart looking for it only to find that he’d already moved it a day or two before.

Sarah had no idea that John was capable of such things, as he was always very careful to present himself as a model partner. He was perfectly aware that she would no doubt run a mile in the opposite direction if she ever found out about his fierce temper. With Sherlock though, he could be as grumpy as he liked and the other man never complained. He shot him the odd, sceptical look but he certainly never complained when John moped about the flat for a couple of days, his limp creeping back into sight.

“Okay, so maybe I am different around her. But that’s only because I don’t want her to think I’m defective.”

“You’re not defective.” Sherlock replied. “Maybe a little rusty around the edges, but definitely not defective.”

“And how do you work that one out?”

“Well for a start, you tell me to piss off if you disagree with me.”

“I thought that’s what just about everyone else you’d ever met said to you. Why is it so different because I tell you to piss off now and again?”

“Because you also tell me I’m brilliant. No one else does that. And no one else has put up with me for this long.”

“That doesn’t prove anything. I’ve stayed at the surgery and I hate it there.”

Sherlock recoiled a little, as though John had just one-upped him. “Okay then, but I still like you even though you’re mean and have little patience.”

“Oh, thank you. I could say the same for you too, you know. And you’ve still not fully explained why you like me. Actually, you‘ve not explained why you want to keep bees or why you think I’m going to be part of it.”

“Which part of that do you want me to answer first?”

“Lets start with why you like me.”

Sherlock shrugged, looking away. “Because you talk to me?”

“I thought people talking about their boring little lives was a turn-off for you.”

“It is.” He shrugged again, his head now resting on his chest. “But you offer perspective. You are pretty boring sometimes though, John. I’m not going to lie to you about that.”

“That’s very considerate.”

“Thank you. You’re not boring all the time though, just so you know. Only when you’ve been over-exposed to _mediocrity_.”

John swallowed again, his mouth suddenly feeling dry. He may not be a consulting detective, but it was obvious that when Sherlock said “mediocrity” what he actually meant was “Sarah”, and all that she entailed.

“Okay. So we’ve established that when I spent too much time around normal people, I become boring and uninteresting. How about the bees, how do they figure in?”

Sherlock toyed with the vinyl cover of his microscope that was slightly hanging over the edge of the table. “They’re fascinating. _Really_ fascinating.”

“And that’s all?” John pressed. “There’s plenty of fascinating things in the world. Why bees?”

“My grandmother kept bees.” He said reluctantly, as though the words were being dragged forcibly from him. “In France. I liked them. She’d let me help with the hives when I spent the summer with her.”

John nodded slightly, acknowledging that Sherlock had just willingly told him his very first piece of family history. “So what about in the winter?”

“What do you mean?”

“If you’re going to keep bees thirty years from now, what are you going to do in the winter? Don’t they hibernate or something?”

“In a way, but not quite. There’s plenty to learn about them. They’ve been studied for hundreds of years, John. I seriously doubt that even I could properly understand them.”

John smirked despite himself. “That’s humble of you, you know.”

“Honestly.” Sherlock snorted. “I could spend all my energy trying to figure out the true meaning of life, but smarter men than me haven’t managed it so far. At least I stand a chance with bees.”

“Fine. So you’ll spend your days unlocking the mysteries of bees. I still don’t understand where I figure in the picture. For a start, you are assuming that I will still be with you thirty years from now. I might not like bees.”

“You’d leave me because you don’t like bees?” Sherlock asked quickly, as though John had just given him a death-threat.

“Not before I left you for being a messy, rude bastard. Or for a boring life doling out antibiotics.”

“So you’re not scared of bees?”

“Not unless they are threatening me, no. Then again, I’m not really scared of guns unless someone is waving one in my direction.”

“Another reason I like you.”

“And what about my plans?”

“You said you didn’t have any.”

“Not immediate ones, no. That’s not to say I won’t in the future. Marriage, kids and all that.”

“John, if you really wanted those things then you would have them. There is no reason why you couldn’t.”

“Maybe I’m just being cautious. They‘re not things you can rush into Sherlock.”

“Cautious about marriage and children? It’s a black and white decision - either you want them or you don’t.”

“There’s a difference between knowing you want them and then finding the person to have them with.”

“Hmm.”

“What?”

“It’s a stupid concept, really.”

“What is? Marriage and kids? Works for most, you know.”

“The concept of going out specifically looking for someone to marry and procreate with. Biologically speaking, marriage is utterly superfluous when it comes to bearing children.”

“I don’t expect you to understand this, Sherlock. And to be frank, I can’t picture you content outside of London for more than five minutes. You complain when you have to go further north than Watford. Not to mention you rarely plan anything. I’ll bet you don’t even know what you’re doing for the rest of today.”

“That is completely different. It’s not a bad thing to have an idea of what you want to do.”

“But if it’s something I want to do, it’s stupid.”

“Oh you and the entirety of Christendom want the same things, John. I shouldn’t have credited you with as much imagination as your blog would have led me to believe. I repeat that if you wanted the things you claim to, you would be well on the way to having them by now.”

Their conversation reached a stalemate. John could think of no reply that wouldn’t receive more hurtful truths in response, and Sherlock had apparently had enough of revealing his family secrets (if beekeeping could be counted as one).

“Blended honey.” Sherlock said eventually as he loosened himself and stood slowly. “It’s made up of different honeys from different hives from all over. It looses its potency when you blend it, and it detracts from all the work the bees do on specific flowers. Did you know that specific flowers give honey distinct tastes?”

John shook his head, lifting his head and staring up at his flatmate. “I didn’t, actually. Is that why you’re pissing yourself silly over my cheap honey?”

Leaning over the table, Sherlock lifted a hand and with his thumb he wiped at the corner of John’s lips. “Like I said - inferior.” He said, licking at the pad of his thumb slowly and cleaning it of the honey that he’d gathered from John. “Nothing at all like the honey we will make.”


End file.
